“It has turned a mere name into an actual person,” was the reply.
“Yes, I know,” rejoined Miller. “Very interesting, too. Now we know exactly what he looked like. But what about it? And what is the next move?”
“The next move on my part is to lay a sworn information against him as the murderer of Julius D’Arblay; which I will do now, if you will administer the oath and witness my signature.” As he spoke Thorndyke produced a paper from his pocket and laid it on the coffin.
The Superintendent looked at the paper with a surprised grin.
“A little late, isn’t it,” he said, “to be swearing an information? Of course you can if you like; but when you’ve done it, what then?”
“Then,” replied Thorndyke, “it will be for you to arrest him and bring him to trial.”
At this reply the Superintendent’s eyes opened until his face might have been a symbolic mask of astonishment. Grasping his hair with both hands, he rose slowly from his chair, staring at Thorndyke as if at some alarming apparition.
“You’ll be the death of me, Doctor!” he exclaimed. “You really will. I am not fit for these shocks at my time of life. What is it you ask me to do? I am to arrest this man! What man? Here is a waxwork gentleman in a coffin—at least, I suppose that is what he is—that might have come straight from Madame Tussaud’s. Am I to arrest him? And there is a casket full of ashes somewhere. Am I to arrest those? Or am I off my head or dreaming?”
Thorndyke smiled at him indulgently. “Now, Miller,” said he, “don’t pretend to be foolish, because you are not. The man whom you are to arrest is a live man, and what is more, he is easily accessible whenever you choose to lay your hands on him.”
“Do you know where to find him?”
“Yes,” Thorndyke replied. “I, myself, will conduct you to his house, which is in Abbey Road, Hornsey, nearly opposite Miss D’Arblay’s studio.”
I gave a gasp of amazement on hearing this, which directed the Superintendent’s attention to me.
“Very well, Doctor,” he said, “I will take your information, but you needn’t swear to it: just sign your name. I must be off now, but I will look in tonight about nine, if that will do, to get the necessary particulars and settle the arrangements with you. Probably tomorrow afternoon will be a good time to make the arrest. What do you think?”
“I should think it would be an excellent time,” Thorndyke replied; “but we can settle definitely tonight.”
With this, the Superintendent, having taken the signed paper from Thorndyke, shook both our hands and bustled away with the traces of his late surprise still visible on his countenance.
The recognition of the tenant of the coffin as Simon Bendelow had come on me with almost as great a shock as it had on the two witnesses, but for a different reason. My late experiences enabled me to guess at once that the mysterious tenant was a waxwork figure, presumably of Polton’s creation. But what I found utterly inexplicable was that such a waxwork should have been produced in the likeness of a man whom neither Polton nor Thorndyke had ever seen. The astonishing conversation between the latter and Miller had, for the moment, driven this mystery out of my mind; but as soon as the Superintendent had gone, I stepped over to the coffin and looked in at the window. And then I was more amazed than ever. For the face that I saw was not the face that I had expected to see. There, it is true, was the old familiar skullcap, which Bendelow had worn, pulled down over the temples above the jaw-bandage. But it was the wrong face (incidentally I now understood what had become of Polton’s eyelashes. That conscientious realist had evidently taken no risks.).
“But,” I protested, “this is not Bendelow. This is Morris.”
Thorndyke nodded. “You have just heard two competent witnesses declare with complete conviction and certainty that this is Simon Bendelow; and, as you, yourself, pointed out, there can be no doubt as to their knowledge of Bendelow since they recognized the photograph of him that was shown to them by the American detective.”
“That is perfectly true,” I admitted. “But it is a most incomprehensible affair. This is not the man who was cremated.”
“Evidently not, since he is still alive.”
“But these two women saw Bendelow cremated—at least they saw him passed through into the crematorium, which is near enough. And they had seen him in the coffin a few minutes before I saw him in the coffin, and they saw him again a few minutes after Cropper and Morris and I had put him back in the coffin. And the man whom we put into the coffin was certainly not this man.”
“Obviously not, since he helped you to put the corpse in.”
“And again,” I urged; “if the body that we put into the coffin was not the body that was cremated, what has become of it? It wasn’t buried, for the other coffin was empty. Those women must have made some mistake.”
He shook his head. “The solution of the mystery is staring you in the face,” said he. “It is perfectly obvious, and I am not going to give you any further hints now. When we have made the arrest you shall have a full exposition of the case. But tell me, now; did those two women ever meet Morris?”
I considered for a few moments and then replied: “I have no evidence that they ever met him. They certainly never did in my presence. But even if they had, they would hardly have recognized him as the person whom they have identified today. He had grown a beard and moustache, you will remember, and his appearance was very much altered from what it was when I first saw him.”
Thorndyke nodded. “It would be,” he agreed. Then, turning
